


Hope Tomorrow Feels Like This

by jenish (phizzle)



Category: Panic At The Disco
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-08-19
Updated: 2006-08-19
Packaged: 2017-10-08 02:24:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/71719
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phizzle/pseuds/jenish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Beta by clumsygyrl. For stumphed.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Hope Tomorrow Feels Like This

**Author's Note:**

> Beta by clumsygyrl. For stumphed.

Spencer wasn't really surprised to get out of his last class on the first day of high school and find Ryan waiting for him. "Hey," he said.

"Hey," Spencer replied, shifting the weight of his book bag. "Want to come hang out at mine?"

"Do you even need to ask?" Ryan shouldered his own bag and they fell into step. "Good first day?"

"Yeah, it was okay." Spencer watched the cars go past as they waited for the road to clear. "You?"

"Not bad." Traffic halted, they crossed. The route was ingrained in their limbs so completely that Spencer sometimes would dream that he was walking to school, and every detail would be intact. "So I was thinking, maybe we could play some more songs today."

"I don't know, I think my mom's in." Spencer considered the options. "I could ask her if she'd be okay with it." He brightened. "I think I've almost got the drum part in 'Wendy Clear' down, we could try that."

"Cool. And maybe 'Jumper' again, we almost nailed it last week."

"That song is so depressing." Spencer kicked at a stone as he passed it.

"Yeah, but the hook is amazing," Ryan said, and Spencer nodded. "Oh hey, I heard about this concert on the first, wanna go? You could tell your parents it's for our birthdays."

"Who's playing?" Spencer brushed his hair out of his eyes.

"Train," Ryan said, grin flashing. Spencer matched it. "Want to?"

"Sure. You can sweet-talk Mom into driving us there if you try really hard."

Ryan rolled his eyes. "Isn't that your job? She's _your_ mother."

"I'm the son whose back she gets on to do my homework. You're the nice kid from down the street she practically thinks of as a son. _You_ ask her."

"I am so not." Ryan hated that he blushed so easily. Spencer poked him in the ribs.

"So are." He darted down the street, chased by Ryan the rest of the way home.

As it turned out, the house was empty of all family members – a note stuck to the fridge told of a trip to the mall and informed of the existence of Snickerdoodles in the jar, should a snack be needed – and Spencer dumped his bag behind the couch. "Come on," he said, grabbing a handful of cookies. "Go get your guitar, I'll be up in my room."

Ryan was back in ten minutes. "My dad's got some friends over," he said, leaning his guitar against Spencer's bed, settling on the soft blankets. "He asked if I'd be coming home for dinner, I said I didn't know but I was coming here. He said he didn't mind if I stayed out to eat."

"Cool. We can play for longer."

"Exactly." He grabbed a cookie and bit into it. "Where should we start?"

~

Spencer was used to waking up and seeing Ryan hunched over in his sleeping bag, reading by the light that escaped through the chink in the curtains. Not that Ryan slept over often; just that whenever he did, he was awake first.

Spencer yawned. "T'm's't?" he asked, lips stuck together. He ran his tongue along them to separate them out.

"Six thirty," Ryan replied without looking. "Hey," he added suddenly, "happy birthday." He looked up, and smiled.

Spencer stretched and reacquainted himself with his pillow. "Thanks."

"How's fourteen feel?" Ryan asked, closing his book and moving to prop his chin on the mattress, folding his wrists under it. Spencer turned onto his side, their heads close together. Conspiratorial.

"It's okay. How's fifteen holding up for you?"

"Pretty sweet," was Ryan's reply. Spencer quirked the half of his mouth that wasn't being pulled by gravity into a smile. He leaned forward, put his lips near Ryan's ear.

"Why does it have to be so early?" he whispered. Ryan bit his lip.

"Because the world turns that way," he whispered back. They muffled their giggles in blankets and each other's shoulders.

From there, it was only a few millimetres. It had happened, once, the night before when they'd been at the concert, in the crowd and the noise and the lights, one arm around each other and the other arm in the air, and Ryan had turned to smack a kiss on Spencer's cheek, and Spencer had turned at the same time and it had almost been too fleeting to register. Neither acknowledged it.

And now, in the half-light, Ryan's lips ghosted over Spencer's skin. They moved, inched closer, and the kiss itself was light. Just lips touching. Brushing, perhaps, except that they stayed almost-pressed together for several seconds – until Spencer leaned back a little and they looked at each other.

Spencer blushed. Ryan chewed on the inside of his lip. "Okay?" he whispered.

Spencer nodded. "Happy birthday to me," he said; Ryan smiled.

"Bet you wish every day was your birthday," he smirked. Spencer hit him with his pillow, and they played the who-can-poke-the-other-more-in-the-arm game until Spencer's father knocked on the door to ask if the birthday boy would like some breakfast.

Ryan stayed for the present-opening, though Spencer had already unwrapped the one from him the day before. (Drumsticks, and a CD.) Mrs Smith asked him if he'd like to stay for lunch, and Spencer said, "It's my birthday, so I get what I want. And I want to hang out with Ry." Ryan laughed and said thanks, he'd love to stay.

They ended up outside in the back yard as the sun went down; on their backs, looking up at the stars coming out, heads together. "Remember doing this last year?" Ryan asked. Spencer laughed.

"I remember you eating all my cake and complaining your stomach hurt," he said, poking the nearest part of Ryan.

"Hey, I did not eat all of it," he protested.

"No, just most of it," Spencer countered.

"It was good cake!" Ryan laughed, scrunching so his arms and legs were defending all softer body parts from further attacks.

"What, are you saying this year's wasn't good? Because that was some fine baked goods, my friend."

"Yeah, but last year's was _phenomenal_."

"I am telling Mom you said that," Spencer grinned. "She got last year's from the bakery."

"Don't you _dare_." Ryan pounced on him, fingers at the ready and beginning the tickling. Spencer laughed and gave as good as he got, until they stilled, silent truce called.

"You're crazy," he told Ryan, breathless.

"Shut up, you love me," was the answer. Another star came out above their heads.


End file.
